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I had a a critique session today with one of my first readers, ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
xrian who is my Subject Matter Expert on "does the religion feel right". The crits were very useful, ranging from "move this expository information on what you're using 'mystery' to mean much earlier in the story" to "you need a lot more God and at least a little more Jesus, but the Mary's about right; also, more relics." I may also need more specific feedback on my characters' habits of quoting untranslated Latin. In part, I want to achieve the feel of a particular slice of a particular culture where slipping in and out of Latin is utterly normal. But I do need to make sure that I'm not hiding relevant information that way. (It doesn't help that the particular Biblical quotation that brought up this issue is both inescapably apropos and unusually opaque to the casual reader. I guess I could have the character quote it in the vernacular instead, but in context it's meant to be an in-joke between two scholars, so that would dilute the effect.)
It has occurred to me that I never double-checked with my other first readers that the file came through safely and is in a format they can open (since I'm using the .docx rather than doc version these days). I am pondering how to inquire about this without it sounding like impatience (which it isn't), but some of them may read this, which would fulfill the purpose.
xrian who is my Subject Matter Expert on "does the religion feel right". The crits were very useful, ranging from "move this expository information on what you're using 'mystery' to mean much earlier in the story" to "you need a lot more God and at least a little more Jesus, but the Mary's about right; also, more relics." I may also need more specific feedback on my characters' habits of quoting untranslated Latin. In part, I want to achieve the feel of a particular slice of a particular culture where slipping in and out of Latin is utterly normal. But I do need to make sure that I'm not hiding relevant information that way. (It doesn't help that the particular Biblical quotation that brought up this issue is both inescapably apropos and unusually opaque to the casual reader. I guess I could have the character quote it in the vernacular instead, but in context it's meant to be an in-joke between two scholars, so that would dilute the effect.)It has occurred to me that I never double-checked with my other first readers that the file came through safely and is in a format they can open (since I'm using the .docx rather than doc version these days). I am pondering how to inquire about this without it sounding like impatience (which it isn't), but some of them may read this, which would fulfill the purpose.
